Sebastian Lletget scored a second-half brace on Sunday night to lift the LA Galaxy to a comfortable 3-0 win over 10-man LAFC in the latest edition of El Trafico at Dignity Health Sports Park in Carson, Calif.
Lletget scored in the 73rd and 83rd minutes, while Cristian Pavon found the back of the net in the 51st minute and added an assist as the Galaxy extended their winning streak to four consecutive games in league play.
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LAFC had the better of play for the entire opening 45 minutes, creating several quality chances and keeping most of the possession, while the Galaxy struggled to get into the match and managed just one shot in the first half.
The intensity hit a new level as the teams returned for the second half.
The deadlock was broken against the run of play when Emiliano Insua lofted a through ball into the path of Pavon, who took a touch and chipped LAFC goalkeeper Pablo Sisniega for his sixth goal of the campaign.
Things got worse for the visitors just minutes later when Mark-Anthony Kaye was shown a straight red card by referee Allen Chapman after a rash challenge on Julian Araujo.
Lletget doubled the home side’s lead with some set-piece magic as the U.S. international made a bending run to find open space in the LAFC box before latching onto a free-kick from Pavon and firing it past Sisniega into the bottom-right corner.
Lletget completed his brace in spectacular fashion as he got on the end of a cross from Rolf Feltscher and executed a beautiful scissor-kick to power it past Sisniega into the right side of the net.
The home side easily killed off three minutes of second-half stoppage time to claim all three points.